Taylor T5 information

[hat]

I've been looking online for information on the various Taylor T5 series guitars, and changes they have had throughout their production. I am amazed at the lack of information available online for these guitars. Taylor must really have the specs and info for these screwed down tight!
I've seen some with one visible pickup, some with two, and read of a T6 model that apparently used an LR Baggs pickup. But all of this is speculative - since as I said online info is pretty well non-existant. Can anyone here help enlighten me?

[s2y]

There are some Youtube clips out that illustrate the tones you can get. A long time ago, Taylor had clips comparing each pickup position through different amps, clean and distorted.

What more do you need to know about it?

[jseth]

I had one of the first T-5's... sold it last year but only because I just didn't play it hardly and needed the $$$$...

I thought it was a terrific little guitar! Bought it for the electric tones available from the Rpert Neve-co-designed pickups and preamp section... mine had one visible pickup, the "lipstick tube" near the bridge, but there was a mini-humbucker buried in the neck that wasn't visible, along with a couple of Taylor's body-sensors...

As s2y stated, mine came with a DVD of a demo of various aspects of the guitar... which was good, but they could have explained the tone controls much better. After a number of years of owning the guitar, I FINALLY figured out a little something about the electronics! They are ACTIVE electronics, and as such function quite differently from a standard Gibson or Fender tone "pot". Turned out that "a little goes a long way" was very accurate... using those tone controls with the 5 way position switch enables an incredibly wide spectrum of electric guitar "sounds"...

I never used position 1 - which was the "most acoustic" sounding setting, combining that neck humbucker with the body sensors... I own a few handmade acoustics that I have good pickups in already; when I play a gig where I want an acoustic guitar, I use one of those... a good friend of mine used pos 1 with his for a great "Tele" neck pickup sound, though...

Pos 2 was the neck pickup ONLY, and I liked that one a lot... sounded more like a Tele with the tone set flat, but go into a Gibson neck pickup-sound with a bit of fiddling with tone controls.

Pos 3 was the bridge pickup ONLY; bright and snappy, going from a Tele bridge to a Gibson bridge pickup using those tone controls.

Pos 4 was the one that sounded like Gretsch Filtrons to me, or maybe a Rickenbacker. I think that has the pickups in series (?)...

Pos 5 was with both pickups in parallel, very much a Gibson "both pickup" type of sound.

At 4.4 #s, the T5 was a JOY to have on my shoulder... the intonation and feel of the neck was excellent, much more precise than either of Gibson electrics (this, after a BUNCH of fretwork!). Fit and finish is Taylor, all the way... very, VERY clean job on the T5s...

I know they've since made more models available; when I bought mine, you could get a maple top or a spruce top (they all have sapele back and sides) in any of the color combo's... in a short time, they began to offer a walnut "burl" top, a koa top... don't know how many they have now. You can get matte finishes, and I believe you can buy one without the body sensors (wouldn't recommend that)...

At first, they offered only the Standard and the Custom. As I got mine for a great price, I thought about the Custom, but the only differences were the shape and size of the fretboard markers and gold hardware (which you KNOW is going to tarnish and peel quickly!).

Hope this is the kind of stuff you wanted to know...

[Gutch]

I also owned one for over a decade until I moved it along last year. Great guitar.

JSeth has the pickup positions mostly right -- Position 4 is the two p'ups in parallel, Position 5 has them in series. Either way, they sound great!!!

[jonfields45]

I've owned a Telecaster Acoustasonic (no bridge electric PUP), an A6 Ultra (best acoustic tone but no bridge electric PUP) and a T5z. The T5z has a tight neck radius combined with acoustic guitar string spacing. As a result whole step stretches of the high-e will fret out at any reasonable action above the 12th fret (which is very hard to set with a non-standard saddle thickness and a problem with the bridge PUP since it is adjustable across a limited range and can't reach up to the high action required). The regular T5 has a flatter fretboard.

I think the T5z was far above the other two for quality of construction, but ultimately too compromised.

If I was on that hunt today, I would buy an electric guitar and then get an acoustic simulator for it. Here is a new one which sounds pretty good in their demos. It should be available by the summer according to the manufacturer.

http://www.sim-one.it/

[guitararmy]

I have a T5. In a band setting I think it does a reasonable facsimile of an amplified acoustic.
If I was looking for something similar on a budget and didn't need the electric sounds, I would look at something like this:

http://acousticguitar.com/renaissanc...tique-guitars/

And there were these:

https://reverb.com/item/6842203-iban...lectric-guitar

[hat]

Originally Posted by s2y

There are some Youtube clips out that illustrate the tones you can get. A long time ago, Taylor had clips comparing each pickup position through different amps, clean and distorted.

What more do you need to know about it?

One thing I would like is a wiring diagram showing how the pickups are all connected. And, as I said, what are the differences between the ones with one 'lipstick tube' pickup, and those with two pickups. Technical info is what I am interested in, not what tones you can get...

[guitararmy]

http://www.acousticguitarforum.com/f...d.php?t=138770

No body sensor...